After a few years of a couple-pies-a-month pan pizza making at home, I decided to moonlight at a NY-style spot. I was intimidated by the prospect of dough stretching (hence the pan pies) and felt the only way I was ever going to nail the technique was through a degree of repetition I'd be unable to achieve in a home setting.
About a week after I'd been hired, the restaurant received a rave review by a major (maybe the biggest) pizza influencer and business was bonkers. This being my first BOH job, I was, understandably, relegated to finishing pies, although even that is not an easy task, I came to find, when a business's volume is high.
I got pretty good at finishing pies, and I never missed a shift, and this led, after about eight months of working weekends, to a full-time employment offer. I want very much to run my own restaurant one day, and I was feeling unfulfilled at my daytime/full-time job, so taking up the offer was a no-brainer.
So now I'm doing it all: prep, stretch, build, ovens, finish, you name it.
When I first started stretching dough, I thought I'd never get anywhere near a professional level of competence. The strides I've made are incredible. I can now get a ball stretched out round and even, and can do so quickly, this coming from a guy whose stretching, even a month or so back, tended to result in skins thin and misshapen. Here, I feel very accomplished and proud.
On the other hand, I can't seem to turn the corner on launching pies. It is strange to me, and maybe it's because the majority of people who seek pizza making resources are home cooks, or maybe it's because it's somewhat difficult to articulate, how little information and instruction there is online as to how one should go about launching a 16" or 20" pizza because I find it by far the hardest/highest-pressure aspect of pizza making.
The general notion seems to be, "don't overthink it." "Get your reps in, and your form will develop." And to a certain extent, there's truth to this. It's not as if I've seen no improvement. The overwhelming majority of pies I launch fall within the acceptable range of size and roundness, but man, some of these guys I turn out, yeah, we can and do sell them, but they look like garbage compared to what the more seasoned hands are capable of.
Where I find myself stumped is the, "don't overthink it," thing, which is the prevailing creed at my operation. If I were launching the same pie, in the same spot of the oven (we use a three deck Pizza Master), the same amount of semola on the peel, the same temperature of dough, every time, sure, that probably would be sage advice. But these pizzas are different weights, and different temperatures, and I feel like launching in the back of the oven is far harder than in the front, as you're much more limited in your visibility.
My method is the standard, "nudge it forward, and once you see it moving, pull it back," but there again there doesn't seem to be a one-size-fits-all approach: some pies are immediately off the peel, others need to be coaxed. There's timing to this that eludes me.
I'm not entirely discouraged since I've seen my stretching reach heights I never thought myself capable of. I believe I'll eventually get this down, too. But I'll also say that part of the dough-stretching improvement came from buying a silicone dough and practicing at home. There is simply no way for me to replicate launching pie-after-pie in my apartment. My only place to practice is at work, where the pressure is always on.
So I'm here to ask: how do I do this consistently? Or, more specifically, how do you do this consistently? What are you looking at when launching? What are you feeling for when launching? How high is your peel on your initial drop? How many backstrokes does it typically take you for a full launch? Any other insights you may have would be appreciated.
